Register  Login  Active Topics  Maps  

Definition of fluency

  Tags: Fluency
 Language Learning Forum : General discussion (Topic Closed Topic Closed) Post Reply
39 messages over 5 pages: 1 2 3 4
Aineko
Triglot
Senior Member
New Zealand
Joined 5288 days ago

238 posts - 442 votes 
Speaks: Serbian*, EnglishC2, Spanish
Studies: Russian, Arabic (Written), Mandarin

 
 Message 33 of 39
02 October 2010 at 10:17pm | IP Logged 
Cesare M. wrote:
Tambien todos, yo hablo espanol fluidez. Si dice que no puedas
entiendas este, no sabes espanol. Hable espanol por 1 ano, y
estudie el idioma muy bien.

Lo siento pero no tengo el keyboard por espanol.

Cesare, have you considered putting this post on websites like Lang-8 or Livemocha,
where it can be corrected by natives? If you do that, you will see how many mistakes
you make. I'm sorry, but I am also of the opinion that you are claiming to have much
higher level in your languages than you actually do. I haven't seen your videos because
you removed them, but I could've told you about your Serbian/Croatian (by the way,
let's face it: from the language learning point of view - it's one language, no need to
count that twice, unless you are running for the Serbian/Croatian government :D ). I'm
wondering in how many languages did you have your level assessed by a native
speaker/tutor?

Volte wrote:
Being able to converse, fluidly, spontaneously, and interactively, about
most/all subjects you can in your native language implies fluency.

This will probably be hair-splitting, but I've always been puzzled by this request of
"most/all subjects". What about subjects that I can't talk about in my native language
simply because I learned them in the foreign language? In my case two of many examples
would be lab equipment and car parts - I had neither worked in a lab or owned a car
before I came to NZ, so I learned pretty much everything about these topics in English.
Not to mention the whole scientific fields I wouldn't be able to talk about in Serbian
with fluidity, because I don't know specific terms. One more recent example is that,
thanks to a fantastic Spanish blogger, I can talk about functioning of the
thermonuclear weapons in Spanish better than in any other language :). On the other
hand, thanks to a ridiculous education system (remains of the communist system) that
tends to teach you everything about everything, I have this bunch of knowledge in my
head, in Serbian, about topics I just have no desire to talk about in any language...
I just really like the definition someone offered about being able to talk about topics
you would like to talk about (plus, of course, those everyday things needed to get
around independently).    
11 persons have voted this message useful



Jinx
Triglot
Senior Member
Germany
reverbnation.co
Joined 5533 days ago

1085 posts - 1879 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, French
Studies: Catalan, Dutch, Esperanto, Croatian, Serbian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Italian, Spanish, Yiddish

 
 Message 34 of 39
02 October 2010 at 10:23pm | IP Logged 
I don't think this is a question of linguistic fluency so much as cultural fluency, and to be particular, pop-culture fluency. Being a native speaker of American English, I of course consider myself to speak English "fluently" – and yet there are innumerable US cultural references that go right over my head. I never watched television as a kid (and rarely watch it now), didn't go to school until I was 15, and for the longest time didn't listen to any music that was made during my lifetime (since 1987). This means that even today, with the help of the internet to educate me about the latest memes and so on, I often have no clue what more "culturally literate" – or I should really say, "POP-culturally literate" people are talking about.

Personally, I don't think it's a problem. I'd rather be able to discuss 19th-century British ghost stories/the 1950s-60s development of rock 'n' roll/the infuriating genius of Socrates (all of which I can do, to one level or another) than be able to sing the theme song from "Friends" or "Twilight Zone," know who Justin Bieber is, quote lines from the latest Judd Apatow disaster, or have any concept of the humor behind "Keyboard Cat." In my social life, I tend to gravitate towards people who share (or at least appreciate) some of the same quirky cultural references that I do. For example (a silly example, but it illustrates my point perfectly), two of my best friends and I like to make odd melodic cooing sounds at each other which wouldn't be recognized by anyone who didn't know the Australian children's TV show "Clangers."

As for gaining this type of pop-culture fluency in a foreign language/culture, I think it's absolutely possible, but takes a lot of time and depends on your passion for the culture (not just the language but the CULTURE) in question. For instance, I'm absolutely in love with everything German, so I've been slowly developing my German cultural fluency. For modern pop culture, I read the news, listen to German pop/rock/rap/folk music, watch German TV shows and movies, and research modern figures of German culture who interest me. For more classic cultural fluency, I read German literature and study its history, see German operas and listen to classical German music. Sure, it takes a lot of work, because I'm here in the US (most of the time), but it does pay off, slowly but surely.

Splog wrote:
Iversen wrote:
If I have to perform advanced smalltalk then I have to watch the local
sitcoms, quizzes and music programs, I have to know gossip about the local celebrities
and I have to know about the formalities that the local authorities have imposed on the
population. Those things are as daunting as learning a few technical terms.


And this only gives you current smalltalk. The problem I constantly face is that locals
in social gatherings continually make cultural references that are almost impossible to
learn. For example, dropping in quotes from childhood TV adverts, or imitating the
voice of some long gone cartoon character. It always makes me feel like an outsider.

The inability to absorb a lifetime of cultural references is why I am always wary of
ambitions to be mistaken for a native. Put any fluent English speaker who was not born
in
the UK with me and a group of brits, and within less than a minute they will think we
are talking a completely unknown language.

"Oh, no Bungle Bonce, you've really done it this time!"
"Do be quiet Zippy!"

or

"Hey, kids, should we look through the round window, or the square window?"

All the brits will be laughing, and the non-brit will be left cringing.

It is an uncomfortable feeling, and one I experience at least once a week.

6 persons have voted this message useful



furrykef
Senior Member
United States
furrykef.com/
Joined 6312 days ago

681 posts - 862 votes 
Speaks: English*
Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Latin, Italian

 
 Message 35 of 39
02 October 2010 at 10:29pm | IP Logged 
Cesare M. wrote:
Tambien todos, yo hablo espanol fluidez. Si dice que no puedas
entiendas este, no sabes espanol. Hable espanol por 1 ano, y
estudie el idioma muy bien.

Lo siento pero no tengo el keyboard por espanol.


Cesare M. wrote:
Todos, no entiendas ahora. Fluentamente es el mucho par el idioma pero no perfecto. Fin.


Cesare M. wrote:
Espero todo pueda entiende.


You're right. Fluency doesn't necessarily imply "perfectly". But your Spanish is horrible -- I'm sorry, but I'm just not going to sugar-coat it anymore -- just like your Latin. It is not fluent, proficient, or any positive word one could use to describe it.

And it's fine not to be particularly good at Spanish... I mean, when I started out, my Spanish was horrible too. The difference is, I was aware of this.

Sure, you could probably read some stuff written in Spanish, the same way I can read some stuff written in Italian having studied that language only minimally. But I wouldn't claim to have any real proficiency in Italian.

Cesare M. wrote:
If you don't understand this, you don't know Spanish.

Well, what you said wasn't Spanish.

- Kef


Edited by furrykef on 02 October 2010 at 10:29pm

15 persons have voted this message useful



Aineko
Triglot
Senior Member
New Zealand
Joined 5288 days ago

238 posts - 442 votes 
Speaks: Serbian*, EnglishC2, Spanish
Studies: Russian, Arabic (Written), Mandarin

 
 Message 36 of 39
02 October 2010 at 10:33pm | IP Logged 
Cesare M. wrote:
Такће, ја научио српском и хвратском в едан ноч.

Cesare, ja ne znam šta si ti naučio za jednu noć, ali ovo što si napisao nije ni srpski
ni
hrvatski. Ovo je neki miks balkanskih jezika napisan na ćirilici gde bukvalno ni jedna
konstrukcija nije pravilna (da i ne pominjem da reči 'takće', 'v', 'edan' i 'noč' ne
postoje
u srpskom i hrvatskom).

I can understand what you meant because it is written down so I could read it couple of
times, but if you are to tell me this sentence in the conversation - that conversation
certainly wouldn't be fluent.

Cesare, since I could understand all that you have written in Spanish, Russian and S/C,
but
also to see that you are making tons of mistakes, I would say that you certainly could
'get
by' in these languages (at least in some situations). To be able to get by in so many
languages (if your other ones are at the same level) - is truly amazing achievement.
There is
no need to waste your time trying to prove that you are fluent in all of them (because
I can
tell you for some of them - you are not). As Volte said, it would be better if you
assess
your level correctly and concentrate on improving (since you definitely possess a
remarkable
potential). Good luck.   

Edited by Aineko on 02 October 2010 at 10:44pm

9 persons have voted this message useful



ellasevia
Super Polyglot
Winner TAC 2011
Senior Member
Germany
Joined 5982 days ago

2150 posts - 3229 votes 
Speaks: English*, German, Croatian, Greek, French, Spanish, Russian, Swedish, Portuguese, Turkish, Italian
Studies: Catalan, Persian, Mandarin, Japanese, Romanian, Ukrainian

 
 Message 37 of 39
02 October 2010 at 11:07pm | IP Logged 
Oh dear. I can't even believe we're still wasting our time on this. From his videos and his posts here it's obvious that Cesare erroneously and stubbornly thinks that he can speak these languages, despite our best attempts at reasoning with him. I don’t think anything we say at this point is going to change his mind, but that doesn’t mean that I agree with him at all. In fact, I vehemently disagree, but I think I've already made that clear.

And just because I can’t stand for this nonsense, I’ll post the corrections to his recent comments in other languages:

ITALIAN
Cesare M. wrote:
Per favore parle Italiano a mi e va a guardo che come tu scrive.

“Please speak Italian to me and I’ll see how you write [it].”

Should be:
Parla Italiano a me per favore, e vedrò come lo scrivi tu.

[EDIT: I don't know why, but the website keeps automatically capitalizing the 'I' in italiano. It was not intentional.]

Cesare M. wrote:
Anche ho aprendo Italiano quando ero piccolo e lo so Italiano tutto bene. Italiano mio é non male!

“Also, I learned Italian when I was little and I know it very well. My Italian is not bad!”

Should be:
Anche, ho appreso (better: imparato) l’italiano quando ero piccolo e lo parlo molto bene. Il mio Italiano non è cattivo!
     
SPANISH
Cesare M. wrote:
Tambien todos, yo hablo espanol fluidez. Si dice que no puedas entiendas este, no sabes espanol. Hable espanol por 1 ano, y estudie el idioma muy bien. Lo siento pero no tengo el keyboard por espanol.

“Everyone, I also speak Spanish fluently. If you say that you can’t understand this [message], you don’t know Spanish. I have spoken [been able to speak] Spanish for one year, and I studied the language a lot. I’m sorry but I don’t have the Spanish keyboard.”

Should be:
Todos, también hablo español con fluidez. Si dicen que no pueden entender este mensaje, no saben español. Hablo español desde hace un año, y estudiaba mucho el idioma. Lo siento pero no tengo el teclado español.

Cesare M. wrote:
Todos, no entiendas ahora. Fluentamente es el mucho par el idioma pero no perfecto. Fin.

“Everyone, you don’t understand now (?). Fluency is knowing the majority of the language (?), but it isn’t perfection. End.”

Should be:
Todos, no entienden ahora. La fluidez es saber la mayoridad del idioma, pero no es la perfección. Fin.

Cesare M. wrote:
Espero todo pueda entiende.

“I hope everyone can understand.”

Should be:
Espero que todos puedan entender.

Cesare M. wrote:
No solo quiero porque no gustas mi español.

This sentence makes no sense to me whatsoever. The literal translation would be something like “I don’t only want because my Spanish doesn’t like you.” I have no idea what he was trying to say.

UNKNOWN
Cesare M. wrote:
Crede que posse giudicare me justo per que guarde?

This is a garbled nonsense mix of Spanish and Italian. It doesn’t make sense from either perspective.

RUSSIAN
My Russian is limited but I can still detect several very elementary errors in your text:

Cesare M. wrote:
Также, меня русский очень хорошо так как я говорю много русский когда я работаю са русских. Если вы не понемаишь это, вы не знашь русский.

“Also, my Russian is very good since I speak a lot with Russians when I work with Russians. If you don’t understand this, you don’t know Russian.”

Should be (I’ve only corrected things that I’m 100% sure about; there might be more errors than I noticed):
Также, мой русский очень хорошо так как я говорю много русский когда я работаю с русскиями. Если вы не понимаете это, вы не знаете русский.

Cesare M. wrote:
Извинете, это просто что я говорю русский много са людей. Также я взял курс на ЛивМока. Но извинете за мое плохое отношение.

“Sorry, it’s just that I speak Russian with many people. I also took a course on LiveMocha. But I’m sorry for my bad attitude.”

Should be (same policy as above):
Извините, это просто что я говорю русский с многими людьми. Также я взял курс на ЛайвМока. Но извините за мое плохое отношение.

SERBO-CROATIAN
Cesare M. wrote:
Такће, ја научио српском и хвратском в едан ноч.

Cesare, thanks for bringing it to my attention that I speak Serbo-Croatian! I was unaware of this previously, but since I can understand your message here with little problem, I obviously speak it fluently. I’ll just go add it to my profile then…



Anyways, now that I've gotten that out of my system, my personal opinion is that this thread should be closed since it serves little or no purpose whatsoever anymore.

Edited by ellasevia on 02 October 2010 at 11:11pm

13 persons have voted this message useful



Aineko
Triglot
Senior Member
New Zealand
Joined 5288 days ago

238 posts - 442 votes 
Speaks: Serbian*, EnglishC2, Spanish
Studies: Russian, Arabic (Written), Mandarin

 
 Message 38 of 39
02 October 2010 at 11:18pm | IP Logged 
ellasevia wrote:

SERBO-CROATIAN
Cesare M. wrote:
Такће, ја научио српском и хвратском в едан ноч.

Cesare, thanks for bringing it to my attention that I speak Serbo-Croatian! I was unaware
of this previously, but since I can understand your message here with little problem, I
obviously speak it fluently. I’ll just go add it to my profile then…

haha, don't add it just yet, since (as I said in the part I wrote in Serbian) - this is
neither Serbian nor Croatian but some mix of all Balkan languages (which looks like
Bulgarian-Serbo-Macedonian-Croatian-wanna be), written in Cyrillic.
Here is the correct version:
Такође, ја сам научио српски и хрватски за једну ноћ.
3 persons have voted this message useful



patuco
Diglot
Moderator
Gibraltar
Joined 6855 days ago

3795 posts - 4268 votes 
Speaks: Spanish, English*
Personal Language Map

 
 Message 39 of 39
02 October 2010 at 11:22pm | IP Logged 
I've read some bad Spanish, Italian and Russian before, but these are the best examples of how not to write and claim fluency at the same time. It's time that this thread was laid to rest now.


9 persons have voted this message useful



This discussion contains 39 messages over 5 pages: << Prev 1 2 3 4

Sorry, you can NOT post a reply.
This topic is closed.


Post ReplyPost New Topic Printable version Printable version

You cannot post new topics in this forum - You cannot reply to topics in this forum - You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum - You cannot create polls in this forum - You cannot vote in polls in this forum


This page was generated in 5.1875 seconds.


DHTML Menu By Milonic JavaScript
Copyright 2024 FX Micheloud - All rights reserved
No part of this website may be copied by any means without my written authorization.